INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGIES FOR EXPLORATION, EXTINCTION AND MONITORING OF COAL FIRES IN NORTH CHINA – FIRST RESULTS OF THE SINO-GERMAN COAL FIRE RESEARCH INITIATIVE

Within a comprehensive Sino-German research initiative, innovative technologies for exploration, extinction and monitoring of uncontrolled coal seam fires in northern China are being studied and further developed. We provide an overview of the scientific and technical set-up of the initiative. We report first results with respect to fire preconditions, geometry and dynamics of the fires as well as aspects of prevention, monitoring and early warning. The methodologies applied within this research range from detailed local mapping and geophysical measurements to large scale observations by means of helicopter geophysics and satellite remote sensing and further more include numerical computer modeling of burning processes, large scale laboratory combustion experiments as well as extensive field mapping activities.

A key prerequisite of this work is the compilation of geographical and geological information, including coal seam data and information on the surrounding materials, as well as anthropogenic influences, including mining activities for the study areas in northern China. Another part of this research initiative focuses on geophysical processes of active coal fires themselves. These include the derivation of static geological 3-D models depicting the given geological strata and coal seams in the test areas. Helicopter borne electromagnetic, magnetic and gamma-ray spectrometer systems are being deployed to geophysically analyze and characterize coal fires on in-situ, local and regional basis. Detailed temperature field measurements and ventilation analysis complement geophysical studies to serve as boundary conditions and calibrate numeric 3D simulations of the fires using finite elements (FEM) techniques. In order to ensure that all results and findings of this project are synergistically merged and interpreted, a “synoptic” work package brings together all data, maps, models and analysis results in a coal fire data warehouse to allow the involved scientists a common analysis and joint interpretation. It furthermore serves as the basis for the derivation of prevention, monitoring and early warning strategies in the context of uncontrolled coal seam fires in the study areas.